Does anyone know why this (1970s?) song is always associated with the image of lions? Was this like the “Jonathan Livingston Seagul” of its day? Also, which came first…the instrumental or the version with lyrics???
Because the movie Born Free was about a lioness called Elsa.
Not having seen it in a number of years, I can’t remember if the theme song was vocally sung in the movie, but the instrumental version was definitely there.
No, the movie was not even remotely like Jonathan Livingston Seagull. It was based on real events. I quite enjoyed it when I was young.
Was it a documentary, like “March of the Penguins”? What year would this have been?
Born Free was released in 1966. I was a little surprised to see it’s that old. It seems like it was on TV all the time when I was a kid in the '80s and I guess I thought it was more recent, like from the late '70s. It’s a scripted movie with actors, not a documentary, but it was based on a true story about a couple who raised an orphaned lion cub and then reintroduced her to the wild.
Before it was a film, it was a book.
Wikipedia is your friend.
The PBS website has an online documentary about the people the movie was based on, available here: http://video.pbs.org/video/1732181741
I’ve never read the book nor seen the movie, but that documentary was quite interesting.
I suppose you could ask why any song becomes associated with a film? Like Bless the Beasts and Children for a contemporaneous theme song. I believe the song was written for the movie. Sort of like Hakuna Mattata. Or maybe it was more like how Vedder’s shadow on the sun is always inextricably linked to collateral through expert cinematography.
sigh I feel so old.
Lawn … get off, yadda yadda yadda
Chris Cornell, formerly of Soundgarden, was the singer for Audioslave so that’s him singing “Shadow of the Sun”. Eddie Vedder is still with Pearl Jam.
Say Jinx, if you still look in on this thread, what made you bring this subject up? I haven’t heard the song Born Free in years! For a long time, it was on every easy listening line-up that came down the pike, and then all of a sudden, it disappeared. I love the song though.
Amazon or IMDB can answer all of your questions, I’m sure. Andy Williams made a minor hit out of the song in 1967.
Yeah, I think the real life story behind this is very interesting. It is sad that after safely interacting with so many large dangerous animals, both of the Adamsons ended up being killed by humans in separate incidents.
Didn’t Mad magazine call this movie “Born Furry”?
I remember a Mad magazine song parody (in print, lyrics only) from '83 or so, called Porn Free - it was a lament about bluenoses exerting pressure on video stores to keep everything family-friendly.
What memories! I loved that movie, and the song…I think it was the first solo I ever sang, in maybe fourth grade for a classroom talent show!
I can play it on a recorder!
Now, if only I can find my recorder…
<goes to look for high school flute…comes back to find everyone has run away>
Maybe they’re all afraid of you hitting the brown note. 
Hmmm… always got those two mixwd up. Thanks for correcting me. It just seems so Seattle incestuous grunge that I was mistaken.
That was like the favorite movie of me and my sister – when we were around six years old.
The movie did not have the lyrics on the opening titles.